Donor kicks off cemetery campaign with big gift

Civil War re-creationists from the Bradbury Camp pay their respects at the Bucktoe Creek Cemetery in Kennett Township during a kickoff ceremony for the “Stewards for a Stone” project on Nov. 3. Staff photo by Wm. Shawn Weigel.

When Crystal Crampton heard that someone had offered to pay for 10 headstones at the Bucktoe Creek cemetery, she broke down in tears.

“It took a few days for me to process it,” Crampton said. “For someone to be so generous, especially with today’s economy, is just a blessing.”

For the past two years, Crampton has spearheaded efforts to restore the Civil War-era cemetery adjacent to the Bucktoe Creek Preserve in Kennett Township.

The cemetery lies in the former location of the New Garden Memorial UAME Church, of which Crampton is a lifelong member, and is part of a larger historic district.

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Crampton first became aware of the cemetery in her youth, hearing stories from church elders and even visiting the spot a few times with her grandmother.

With the cemetery in disarray and with nearly all of the graves either unmarked or poorly designated, Crampton took it upon herself to try and change things for the better.

She also said that, with many of the other UAME members being advanced in years, if she didn’t take up the reins on the project it was unlikely anyone would.

“I believe that everyone deserves to matter, whether it’s a marker or a full headstone,” Crampton said. “It just kind of fell into my lap and I said, ‘well I’ll take it as far as I can.’ And I’m trusting that God is going to help me do it.”

The donation for the stones came just days after Crampton and the Land Conservancy for Southern Chester County held a kickoff for their “Stewards for a Stone” program, spurred by an article that ran in the Daily Local News.

The sweetheart donation from an anonymous donor will pay for 10 stones for the nearly 100 graves in the sprawling cemetery.

“I call them the angel of the cemetery,” Crampton said. “I didn’t think we would get such a quick response, I figured it would take more than a few years.”

At $432 a stone, it would take a donation of over $43,000 to equip every grave; the kickoff donation of $4,320, Crampton said, is still a major drop in the proverbial bucket.

Gwen Lacy, executive director at the land conservancy, said the cemetery is an important component of its “Living History” walks as well as a connection between the land and its history.

“We really wanted to see it preserved because it’s within one of the largest contiguous historic corridors in the township,” Lacy said.

Lacy said that when the conservancy first got involved with the cemetery, the pieces fell quickly into place as far as making the right connections to help the project take off.

The biggest piece of that puzzle, she said, was meeting restoration coordinator Gene Hough, who makes the stones himself from a latex cast of an existing stone.

Hough is going to cast the new stones over the winter, and hopes to have some of them in place by spring of 2013, according to Lacy.

Crampton said it was the association with the conservancy that helped get word of the project out to the public in the first place.

“It’s been a nice ride and a good partnership with them. They have me for life,” Crampton said.

She’s also still overwhelmed by the generosity of the people in the community who have helped support the project, from the private donor to the people who helped them bring in more than $100 at the kickoff.

“These people do exist,” Crampton said.

“It’s like Gene always said, magic happens when you’re working in a cemetery,” Lacy said.